Stay With Me
by Temari 88
Summary: - "Even if I try to empty my mind from everything, it just seems impossible… and if I close my eyes, I can see today’s 'accident' repeating again, and again… I see all that red…" - *Birthday fic for Mariana-sama*


_Hello!! :D_

_Ok, I won't waste a lot of time with the introduction :P I just wanted to wish once again a HAPPY B-DAY to Mariana-Sama (my best reviewer ever!) and apologize for the week's lateness of my b-day fic... BUT HERE IT IS!!_

_This story was originally written in italian and translated (by me) so that I could share it with everyone else! :P_

_Rated M (to be sure) because there's: blood, mentions of multiple attempted suicide and murder_

_Paring: NarutoGaara_

_Warnings (beside those of above): if you don't know who Naruto's parents are, you'll have the surprise ruined :D_

_Disclamer: Naruto does not belong to me_

_Ok, that's it! Read&Review!! XD_

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**_STAY WITH ME_**

_**By Temari 88**_

**_Gaara's POV_**

From the roof, I lift my gaze to look at the dark sky; it stretches across the world like a huge canvas where the sole color present is black, the careful brushstrokes interrupted only by a few stars –brighter than normal due to the lack of moon-. No other light illuminating this part of the city. In a night like this, it is comforting.

Carefully hidden beneath the branches of the trees that surround the house (a little far from the bristling chaos of cars and the like of the city nearby), I hear the faint noise of the cicadas chirping quietly into the summer's air; their gentle humming disrupting the otherwise oppressive quiet of this hour.

It is not unusual, in a night such as this, for me to stay perched on top of my house: it happens often. When I can't sleep or when too many thoughts plague my mind… I sneak here. This is my 'sanctuary', if you like. Every time I need to analyze rationally my thoughts, I come here; the roof also helps me to forget, for a short while, all those thoughts. Its purpose, actually, is _mostly_ to get me _not_ to think about certain things.

This is my secret place. Mine and mine alone.

It doesn't always work, though.

"Seems like tonight I'll have a hard time relaxing…" I mumble to myself, eyes fixed on my shoes.

Yes, because… even if I try to empty my mind from everything, it just seems impossible… and if I close my eyes, I can see today's "accident" repeating again, and again…

I see all that red…

_**(Flashback)**_

_**7.30 am**_

_**I stretched out a hand to my right, to caress my boyfriend's soft skin, but the subconscious part of my brain told me that the bed beside me was empty. As soon as I registered the information, I shot up in an upright position, back painfully rigid; I looked around the bedroom, my eyes scanning every crevice and every shadow.**_

_**I**__** was worried. My heart beat far too quickly to be anywhere near comfortable.**_

_**I know it seemed an exaggerated reaction, but it had a valid reason. I got out of the bed in nothing but a pair of dark blue boxers and headed to the kitchen, to make sure my lover had only got downstairs for some breakfast or something of the like.**_

_**Once in the kitchen, I saw that nothing was misplaced or had been used to prepare any kind of food: everything was in order, all the items were where they had been the previous night; no sign of glasses or bowls in the sink waiting to be washed. Just as I was about to turn around to go check in another room, my eyes fell on a drawer: the knives' one. It was slightly open.**_

_**Fear flooded me. I turned on my heels swiftly, my heart beating as if crazed. I didn't really know how, but I knew exactly where to go and I was afraid of what I could have found in there. I prayed to all the Gods above to be in time…**_

_**I reached for the bathroom's handle and opened – more like**_ **ripped into**_**- the door.**_

_**"NARUTO!!"**_

_**He was there, slumped over the edge of the bathtub.**_

_**From where I stood, still shocked, I could only see the knife lying on the flood near his fainted form and one of his arms, bent awkwardly on the tiled floor… his hand was tilted upwards, leaving in plain sight the straight cut on his wrist, from which Naruto's blood continued to ooze out at a steady rhythm.**_

_**Blood that had already created a fairly large pool around him. Blood that was staining the light t-shirt the blond young man was wearing…**_ **my** _**blond man…**_

_**Meanwhile, I had neared him to make sure I had made it in time: luckily, my Naruto was still alive…**_

_**I grabbed the first aid kit and, turning Naruto around, I noticed that his other wrist had a cut as well: the blood covering the lower part of the bath. Sighing sadly, I washed and dressed up the wounds. Then, I just stayed there, watching the pained expression adorning the blond that rested in my arms.**_

_**Naruto's face had changed a lot. His skin had always been a beautiful bronze**__** color**__**, soft like that of a child; he'd always been such a sunny person… he was outgoing and wanted to make friends with everyone. He had always a smile on his lips… a kind of 'stupid' smile, and his laugh was contagious, and clear: he had the power of making everyone feel happy.**_

**_"_Now… you're so pale and skinny... you changed completely: you're so distant and closed in yourself –even with me-. Gods…! How much time has passed, since I last heard his laugh or seen his smile…? Seems forever…!"** _**I thought as I brushed away bangs from his forehead.**_

"_**Please, Naru-kun… return your old self… I can't stand to see you like this…" I begged in a whisper while I caressed his cheek.**_

_**"…… Ga…. Gaara……." Naruto creaked open his eyes. I turned him around gently and hugged him.**_

**_"…… Gaara…." He repeated in an almost inaudible release of breath._**

_**"I'm here. It'll all be okay, Naruto. All will be alright…" I answered, trying to comfort him; or maybe trying more to comfort myself…**_

_**"….. Gaara….. I…. I want to die…." He said to me, his voice plain and very distant.**_

_**(End Flashback)**_

_**"….. Gaara…. I…. I want to die…."**_

Those words still hunt my mind. Every time he tries to end his life and, despite everything, he finds himself waking up on our bed, he always says those damn words to me. I understand it. I know what he's going through, and I know he doesn't realize how much pain I have to endure… because the pain _he_ suffers is bigger and a lot more unbearable.

I know the reason why Naruto has… has tried -_more than once_- during these two years, to end his life. I know it, because I was there, when it happened; I was right beside him the day when… when _everything_ was destroyed; the day when something very important, in Naruto, fell to pieces.

Many times I find myself reliving that day. It's so ironic to think how, before all that horror, the morning had gone perfectly and in blissful calm. Naruto and I had had a date –we'd been together for awhile already- and we had fun at the city's amusement park.

_**(2**__**nd**__** Flashback)**_

_**It was early afternoon, when we got back to my boyfriend's house –it was still strange to call him that-. As soon as I stepped up to the front door, I knew something was amiss: there was a strange atmosphere surrounding the small building. Cold shivers were running up and down my spine and, turning to my left, I saw Naruto shivering a bit too.**_

_**With a shaky hand, Naruto opened the door. The entrance seemed okay, nothing was out of the ordinary: two pair of shoes (a sign that someone was at home) were aligned neatly near a small table with keys, letters and the like on top. The house was eerily silent… anxiousness invaded my body all the more… both me and Naruto didn't waste time in taking our shoes off: I went into the dining/living-room while the blond went upstairs.**_

_**As I entered the room, the first thing I noticed was the couch lying on the floor upside down; the low coffee table was on one side and the dining table was broken in three parts, the remains of a light lunch on the floor. The kitchen was a complete mess: all the doors of the cupboard were open; the things that were inside thrown throughout the room, glasses and plates were in pieces.**_

_**The first thing I thought of, was a fight and immediately my eyes caught sight of various drops of blood that lead from the kitchen to the first floor of the house… as soon as I put a feet on the lower step of the stair, I hear Naruto scream: a desperate and shocked sound (thinking back, it was like in that scream I could have heard his soul and mind cracking).**_

_**I run up the stair, three steps at a time, and following the dark stains on the carpeted floor, I reached the room where my boyfriend was.**_

_**The door was wide open on a scene that I would never be able to forget: the cream **__**colored**__** wall in front of me was covered in dark red; on top of the bed, the bodies of Kushina and Minato Uzumaki… the two of them were lying there, in each other's arms, and they looked as if they were sleeping… the 'picture', though, was horribly ruined by the fact that they were in a pool of blood…**_

_**I felt my stomach turn upside down, as I saw that Naruto's father had a bullet hole in his head… and that Kushina's body (such a beautiful and youthful woman, with the same outgoing nature as her son), barely covered by her husband's one, had nothing on…**_

_**I tried to breathe in deeply and, on shaky legs, I neared Naruto… till then, he had remained on the floor where he had collapsed, unmoving, un-reacting…**_

_**"…. N-Naruto….?" I asked whispering, crunching down beside him.**_

_**"………………" He didn't answer, he didn't look at me; he kept staring ahead, his eyes empty.**_

_**"Naruto…. Please, do something…."**_

_**"……….. -ll me…"**_

**_"Naruto….! Naru-!"_**

_**"……**_ _**Gaa….. ra….?"**_

_**"Yes, it's me. I'm here…. Narut-"**_

_**"Gaara….. kill me….?" **_

**_"_Wha-? No! How can he ask this off me…?!"** _**I thought shocked as I looked at the young man that I loved: his eyes were begging me to free him of the terrible pain he was suffering.**_

"_**Naruto… you**_** can't**_** ask me this…!" I said in a hushed frightened whisper.**_

_**He didn't get to answer because, as I finished speaking, he fainted in my arms.**_

_**(End 2**__**nd**__** Flashback)**_

Once again I look up at the sky, a little lighter than before: soon the sun will rise. As always, after an episode like that of yesterday, I've spent all night up here…

"Gaara…?" Naruto's voice drifts outside from the bedroom, muffled by the walls.

How strange, he's already awake… usually, after an attempted suicide, he sleeps in… sometimes he doesn't wake up for a whole day. I don't get down immediately. His voice almost seemed normal, like the one he used to have… flashes of memories, _happy_ memories, unroll behind my lids: I see again his wide and joyful smile; I hear again his amused laughter…

_**"….. Gaara…. I…. I want to die…."**_

_**"I wanna… go with them…"**_

Then, those cursed words… without me noticing, a tear escapes my self-control and I let it go: I don't have the strength to wipe it away just yet, not when the echo of Naruto's pleas is resounding in my head. Pain's firm grip holds me in a choking prison; I can't breathe and I barely suppress a wrecking sob.

"Gaa-kun…? Where are you…?" Calls again my boyfriend.

"_Naruto…"_ I think.

I get up, wipe away the few tears that had escaped me and slowly make my way down the roof. I breathe in deeply, preparing for another agonizing day in which I have to force myself to hide all my resignation, anxiousness and worry.

"_Naruto… don't go away… stay here with me, please…"_

_**OWARI**_

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_I know, it was mostly flashback but bear with me :P_

_I really hope you all liked it!!_

_See ya, folks! :D_


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